


A Second Chance

by Robin Hood (kjack89)



Series: Double Jeopardy (Professor Barba) [1]
Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Alternate Universe - Professors, Developing Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-19
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2019-03-06 16:43:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13415397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kjack89/pseuds/Robin%20Hood
Summary: Columbia Law School professor Rafael Barba receives a surprise visit from an NYPD detective looking for his help.





	A Second Chance

**Author's Note:**

> Because of [all those gifs from Raúl guest-starring on The Path](http://all-things-raul-esparza.tumblr.com/post/169825730099)...this more or less wrote itself.
> 
> Toying with the idea of a sequel, so if you think it'd be something you'd want...let me know.
> 
> Eternal gratitude to AHF, for making this infinitely better.
> 
> Usual disclaimer. Please be kind and tip your fanfic writers in the form of comments and/or kudos!

Rafael Barba leaned against his desk and carefully rolled his cardigan sleeves up before glancing up at the class. “Habeas corpus,” he pronounced, watching with some amusement as the students in front of him furiously typed on their laptops, even though he had said exactly two words. He remembered when he started teaching at Columbia Law ten years past, when majority of students still used spiral notebooks to take notes.

Part of him missed those days.

He waited for most of the eyes in the class to look back up at him. “Who can tell me which amendment in the Bill of Rights protects our right of habeas corpus?”

A few hands shot in the air, and Barba nodded at a girl in the second row. “The Sixth Amendment?” she said, her voice inflecting her answer as a question.

“Are you asking me or telling me?” Barba returned, with a half-smirk and a quirked eyebrow.

She blushed slightly, but met his gaze evenly. “Telling you,” she said confidently.

His smile widened. “I admire your confidence,” he said, and she beamed at him. “Unfortunately, you’re wrong.” Her smile faltered and Barba pointed at a different student. “Do you have another guess?”

“Uh, Fourth Amendment?” he supplied.

“You sound about as confident as Ms. Hirsch,” Barba told him, “and you’re just as wrong.” He scanned the room. “Any other volunteers?”

“It’s not in the Bill of Rights,” a voice called from the back of the room, and Barba looked up, startled, taking in the sight of the man leaning against the back wall. “It’s in the Constitution. Article 1, Section 9, Clause 2.”

The man was tall and lanky, and even from across the room, Barba could tell that he was heart-stoppingly gorgeous. Of course, not even good looks could make Barba forgive him for casually slumping against the wall, as though Barba’s classroom were a pool hall rather than a place of higher learning.

Barba looked at him coolly, measuring him and dismissing him in about twenty seconds. “The police officer visiting our class is correct,” he told the class, who all craned their necks to ogle the man in question. “Habeas corpus is not in the Bill of Rights. Which does _not_ mean that we shouldn’t discuss it, even if this course is mostly focused on the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Amendments.”

He turned to the chalkboard and started jotting a few things down, conspicuously ignoring whomever was visiting his classroom and trying very hard not to think about what someone from the NYPD could possibly want with him. Luckily, Barba didn’t believe in PowerPoint or Smartboards or the kind of technology that would have allowed him to have his notes pre-written, and sketching out the basics of habeas corpus and its uses in the law were a suitable distraction for the rest of the class.

The officer stayed for the entirety of Barba’s lecture, standing at the back of class and seemingly hanging on to every word Barba said. In fact, Barba was fairly certain he checked his phone less frequently over the course of the class than the students he was actually teaching did. Only when Barba had finally dismissed the class did the officer finally make his way to the front of the room. “Should I be worried that none of your students know where to find habeas corpus in the Constitution?” the officer asked, making his way down the stairs of the lecture hall, his hands in his pockets.

Barba glanced at him, taking in his neat suit and slightly poofy hair and wishing desperately that neither of those things worked for him. “It’s a first year course on criminal law,” he said. “Now, if you were in my 3L seminar on trial law, we’d be having a different conversation.”

The officer laughed. “Fair enough,” he said easily.

"Can I help you with something, Officer?" Barba asked, glancing at the shield on his hip and correcting, "I mean, Detective."

The detective smiled at him in what he clearly thought was a disarming way, and Barba's eyes lingered on the other man's dimples for a moment too long before he turned to erase the notes he'd written on the blackboard in the classroom. "As a matter of fact, I _was_ hoping to get your help with something, Counselor."

Barba glanced at him again and set the eraser down to roll up the sleeves of his shirt. "I'm not an ADA anymore, Detective," he said tiredly, the old title stirring up memories he’d spent a long time trying to forget, memories of an old life he barely recognized as his own anymore. "I haven't been an ADA in a long time. You don't have to call me Counselor."

The detective shrugged, and if Barba wasn't mistaken, his eyes tracked Barba's now bare arms as he picked the eraser back up. "Hey, once an ADA, always an ADA, right?"

Barba snorted lightly. "Tell that to the New York State Common Retirement Fund." He quirked an eyebrow at the detective. "So, are you going to actually ask for whatever you want my help with, Detective...?"

"Carisi," the man supplied, grinning again, and he offered his hand for Barba to shake. "Sonny Carisi. Of Manhattan SVU." Barba shook his hand, his touch lingering perhaps a second too long, before Carisi held up the file in his other hand. “And I was hoping you could help me with this.”

Barba took the file, his curiosity piqued. “A case?” he asked.

Carisi nodded. “One you’re familiar with: Daniel Pryor. He’s been implicated in a new string of rapes.”

Barba looked from the case file in his hand up at Carisi, the color draining from his face. “Daniel Pryor?” he repeated, his voice sounding odd, even to his own ears. Too far away, removed. “What does that have to do with me?”

Carisi blinked. Whatever reaction he’d been expecting, this clearly wasn’t it. “You almost put him away,” he said slowly, clearly trying to determine if Barba honestly didn’t recognize the case or if he was purposefully obfuscating. “In fact, you were the only ADA who ever got close.”

“Right up until the judge vacated the verdict,” Barba said flatly.

Something like relief flashed across Carisi’s face and he managed a small smile. “So you do remember.”

“Of course I remember,” Barba said, a little bitterly as he gripped the file too tight and stepped to the side.  Back behind his desk, away from the life he thought he’d left behind as though the admittedly solid carpentry would shield him from it. “It was my last case for the DA’s office.” 

He’d left shortly afterwards. Justice had once been what Barba cared about, but this case more than anything had proven that justice was often harder to come by than it should be. Sometimes it wasn’t attained at all.  He took a deep breath and forced himself to look back up at Carisi.

“You don’t want me for this,” he said finally, tossing the file down on his desk. He was surprised to find how much he meant it. “I couldn’t get him when I was at the top of my game, and I haven’t practiced law in ten years. I’m not your guy.”

But instead of recognizing Barba’s words for the clear dismissal that it was, Carisi perched on the edge of Barba’s desk. “But when you were at the top of your game, you were the best,” he said lightly.  His voice was gentler than it should have been; the detective was sugaring him up, offering a pretty face and sweet words like he was coaxing a spooked horse back into its stable.

Barba stilled, eyeing Carisi warily. “What would you know about it?” he asked. “You’re a little young to have been on the force ten years ago.”

“Really?” Carisi asked, a little ruefully, raising a hand to the gray hair that darkened his temples. “I guess I should take that as a compliment, but I’m 37, Counselor. Besides…” He trailed off, looking a little embarrassed. “I, uh, I followed your career from when I was straight outta the Academy,” he admitted and Barba’s eyes were drawn to the bloom of color creeping up the man’s neck. “You were always on TV in those fancy suits—” Barba looked down at his wrinkled chinos and rumpled cardigan and made a rueful expression. “—and, uh, you made me wanna be a lawyer.”

“And instead you became a detective,” Barba said, with a small smirk.

Carisi rolled his eyes. “ _Not_ that it’s any of your business, but I’m actually in law school right now — night school at Fordham.”

“Double threat, I see,” Barba remarked somewhat sincerely.

Carisi eyed him warily. “I mean, I know it’s not Columbia—”

“So few schools are,” Barba said archly.

“Or Harvard,” Carisi continued, “but it’s a good school.”

“It _is_ a good school,” Barba acknowledged. “And, frankly, if you can manage law school while working full-time as a detective, you have my respect. I barely made it through my 3L year and I was only working part-time in the Harvard law library.” Carisi grinned at that, and Barba drank in the sight of those dimples once more before shaking his head and looking back at the file he’d tossed on the desk. He had a bad feeling that he knew what the detective was after, and he was afraid that he’d only end up disappointing him one way or another, his previous failure as fresh in his mind as if it had happened yesterday instead of ten years before. Still, whether it was because of the dimples or the fact that he was impressed more than he would ever admit by Det. Carisi’s work ethic, he looked up at him and asked, “So what do you need from me?”

Carisi leaned forward, suddenly eager now that he’s been given the green light. “Help me go over the case,” he said. Insistent, imploring. Earnest in a way that made Barba think it came naturally. “Take a look at the latest victims and see what I’m missing, make sure that what we present to the jury this time is so bulletproof that no judge would dare toss it out.”

Barba frowned slightly. “Tempting as the thought of sending that bastard away for preferably twenty-five years may be, I still think you’re asking the wrong person. I appreciate you thinking highly of me, but there are ADAs who are just as skilled as I used to be.” 

“Just as skilled, maybe, but none of them are passionate as you are — or at least, as passionate as you used to be,” Carisi said, something almost urgent in his tone. “No one else wants to see this guy behind bars more than you, and I need that before I can take it to the ADA.” He straightened and held the case file out to Barba once more. “I’m giving you a second chance, Counselor — a chance to nail him, once and for all. And without even having to worry about double jeopardy.”

An almost involuntary smile twitched at the corner of Barba’s mouth. “A cop who actually cares about the Bill of Rights?” he asked, aiming for a joke but hitting somewhere a little too sincere. “For that alone, I’ll help you.” A bell chimed in the distance and Barba glanced at his watch and sighed. “But not right now, I’ve got another class in twenty minutes.” He looked back up at Carisi. “Can you come back tonight? That way I’ll have time to actually look this over.”

“Sure,” Carisi said. “When’s your last class?”

“It ends at 6:30,” Barba said. “So give me until...let’s say seven, so I can read it over?”

Carisi raised both eyebrows, looking almost impressed. “You think you can read that entire file in a half hour?”

Barba smirked. “I think I can read it twice.”

Carisi laughed and shook his head. “Sure,” he said, slowly backing away, his hands in his pockets. “Seven tonight. I’ll see you then, Counselor.”

“Call me Rafael,” Barba called after him, though he wasn’t sure why he did.

Carisi just flashed those dimples at him one more time before disappearing through the open door, into the throng of students now swarming the hallway. Barba sighed, glancing back down at the case file and looking at his watch again.

He was suddenly tempted to cancel the rest of his classes for the day so he could go back to his apartment and change into something slightly less...professorial.

Luckily, he was saved from the absurdity of his own thoughts by the first of his students from his next class trickling in, and Barba tossed the case file back on his desk, forcing the thoughts of Daniel Pryor, and Det. Carisi, and dimples and blue eyes, from his mind.

At least, from his mind until that night.

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [A Second Chance [Podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14310978) by [monstrous_eliza (ships_to_sail)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ships_to_sail/pseuds/monstrous_eliza)




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